In a narrative video the characters differ although often the narrative does involve the band either as part of the story or conventionally in a performance aspect of the narrative video. Bon Jovi's "Have a Nice Day" for example. Another character convention of the rock genre is a female love intrest. The most popular convention involving the love intrest is the protagonist pursuing her, or rejecting her. An example of this is Nickelback "How You Remind Me"
The mise-en-scene of a video can also help highlight the conventions of a genre. For example the conventional costume of a rock video is; jeans, leather and denim jackets along with vests, for men in the video. The costume for women is similar as they also wear jeans and often vests, the key difference is the women's clothing is more revealing and tighter fitting. This sexualisation is there to make the video appeal to the genre's target audience, which I feel is men aged 16 and over. Another similarity between the male and female costume is that they are both relatively dark colours. Again "Sweet Child O Mine", "Have a Nice Day" and "How You Remind Me" are good examples of meeting these conventions.
The conventions when it comes to lighting is the same as characters, it depends on the video. A convention of performance video lighting is that the lighting reflects the mood and themes of the song, "How You Remind Me" by Nickelback for example has a very dark theme to it, love, rejection and manipulation, and the lighting reflects this. The lighting itself is low key and gives a bleak atmosphere and although the majority of the video is performance based there are narrative aspects and again in these scenes the lighting still reflects the themes of the song. The best example is that all the narrative scenes are bathed in a grey, low key hue, which to me has connotations of isolation and rejection.
This is a contrast to the conventions of a narrative based video as in these the lighting suits the location as oppose to the themes. For example in "Have a Nice Day" the majority of the video is the members of the band in various locations across a city spotting the cover for the album "Have a Nice Day". So to suit these locations the video uses natural light and high key lighting, which has connotations of a lively upbeat atmosphere.
Much like lighting the acting we see in a rock genre music video is down to the type of video used. In a performance video the facial expression and body language we see conventionally is expressions and gestures that emphasises the band's love of performing. An example of this convention is the band smiling and the singer gesturing to the audience to emphasise that he or she is at ease on stage and wants to involve the audience as much as possible A good example of this is Jon Bon Jovi in "Have a Nice Day". The alternative convention to this is that the singer and band are so focused on and engrossed by their performance that their facial expressions are more serious and their body language is tense. I feel this still shows the band's love of performance as the tense body language and facial expressions to me have connotations of passion for what their doing. A good example of this type of acting from a singer is Axl Rose from Guns 'N' Roses in "Sweet Child 'O' Mine.
In a narrative video the acting not only show the emotions of the performer they also show the performance of a protagonist who often is not part of the band they also conventionally help emphasise the themes and the affect these themes have on the protagonist whether he is part of the band or not. For example in the video to "How You Remind me" by Nickelback the video has narrative and performance aspects with the band's singer Chad Kroeger as the protagonist. In the performance scenes of the video he follows the acting convention of tense body language to highlight his passion for performing and his focus. However in the narrative scenes his facial expressions follow the convention of helping to express the themes of the song, which in the case of "How You Remind Me" are love, rejection and the pain these things can cause, and Kroeger's facial expressions reflect this.
The convention for make up in the rock genre is basic make up and all the videos I have shown here follow this convention. However the sub genres of rock don't follow this convention, in some cases having more make up has become a convention of the sub genres. For example "Glam Rock" bands often wear more make up than usual. KISS are an example of this. Another example of a make up convention in a rock sub genre is that in "Punk Rock" they wear a lot of hair product and extra make up. Green Day for example.
The most popular props in a rock video are musical instruments, which I feel makes them the most widely used convention of the genre. All the videos I have shown here follow this convention, other than the instruments widely used props are accessories for the costume such as bandannas, sunglasses or necklaces and again all three videos follow this convention. I also feel that bands use a prop so often it becomes their specific convention. Slash's top hat or Jon Bon jovi's white microphone stand for example.
An entirely narrative based video is rare in the rock genre with the most popular choices for a video being either performance based or a cross between performance and narrative. However the conventions of an entirely narrative based video is for the narrative to be linear and to reflect the themes of the song, love or over coming adversity for example. In a cross over video the convention of a linear narrative is often challanged. "How You Remind Me" is an example of challenging this convention as the narrative regularly jumps between flashbacks of Chad Kroeger and the "love intrest" to the band performing before then jumping forward to Kroeger rejecting the woman. The video for "Have a Nice Day" does follow the convention of a linear narrative with band members been seen in an urban area surronded by images of the album cover the song comes from before the video finally ends with Bon jovi performing. Overall I feel an entirely performance based video doesn't have a narrative.
The conventional themes of a rock song are love and passion, rejection, over coming adversity and nostalgia. All three videos I've shown use these conventional themes. The themes of "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" are love and nostalagia and the lyrics reflect this "her hair reminds me of a once safe place" for example. similarly The themes of "How You Remind Me" are love rejection and the pain those feelings can cause, the lyric "I'm sick of sight without a sense of feeling" emphasises this. Finally "Have a Nice Day" follows the conventional theme of over coming, which in this case I feel is economic hardship. "Looking for forgivenes and what's left to believe" is a lyric that best highlights this I feel.
Conventionally editing in a rock video has a relatively quick tempo with fast cuts and examples of invisible editing. Another editing convention is to cut from a black and white shot to colour, "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" follows this convention. Also conventionally the editing can be used to help reflect the themes of the song as well. For example in the narrative based scenes of the "How You Remind Me", the pain of the protagonist is emphasised by the slower pace of the editing and then speeding up again on the more upbeat performance based scenes.
Conventional camera shots for a performance based video are wide angle shots that focus on the whole band, as well as shots that focus on the band's leading members, which in the case of Guns 'N' Roses are Slash and Axl Rose. Conventional ways of doing this are with mid shots and close ups of the performer from various angles, as well as having conventions on how to film a specific band member. For example a popular way of filming the singer is to use a tracking shot of the singer moving up and down stage or a close up of the lead guitar playing during a solo. One convention of camera work in a performance video that "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" doesn't follow is shots of the audience to establish that it's a live performance. This is because there isn't an audience there during the video, which also challanges a convention of a performance based video. This is a convention that the videos to "Have a Nice Day" and "How You Remind Me" follow this convention as thier is an audience in the performance based scenes of the videos and thier are examples of establishing shots of the audience during these scenes.
For a narrative video or narrative based scenes of a video the camera shots have a more ciniematic feel and therefore have similar conventions. For example tracking shots of the protagonist moving down a street and close ups of female actors to help entice the target audience which I feel is men aged 16 and over. In the video to "Have a Nice Day" a convention that is challanged is to only focus on the frontmen of the band as throughout the narrative scenes of the video all members of the band are tracked across an urban area before being all together for the performance when the video reverts to the convention of focusing on the band's front men, Jon Bon jovi and Richie Sambora.
The convention for make up in the rock genre is basic make up and all the videos I have shown here follow this convention. However the sub genres of rock don't follow this convention, in some cases having more make up has become a convention of the sub genres. For example "Glam Rock" bands often wear more make up than usual. KISS are an example of this. Another example of a make up convention in a rock sub genre is that in "Punk Rock" they wear a lot of hair product and extra make up. Green Day for example.
The most popular props in a rock video are musical instruments, which I feel makes them the most widely used convention of the genre. All the videos I have shown here follow this convention, other than the instruments widely used props are accessories for the costume such as bandannas, sunglasses or necklaces and again all three videos follow this convention. I also feel that bands use a prop so often it becomes their specific convention. Slash's top hat or Jon Bon jovi's white microphone stand for example.
In a rock video the locations depend on the type of video and often the lyrics and theme of the song. In a performance based video there are several conventional locations such as rooftops, underground clubs, stadiums or theatres. Another popular choice for a rock video is not to have an audience present for the filming of the performance, the video for "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" is an example of this. The "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" video also follows the location convention of filming the video in a studio. The other videos I've shown also follow location conventions. The video to "Have a Nice Day" ends in a theatre and the video for "How You Remind Me" regularly cuts back to Nickelback performing in a club. "How You Remind Me" and "Have a Nice Day" also follow conventions for narrative video locations. In this case telling the story in an urban area.
Iconography is images you associate with something. Conventions of iconography in a rock video are having a stage or the band members having long hair. In the videos I've shown some of these conventions are met for example all of the Nickelback band members have long hair in "How You Remind Me" as do all of Guns 'N' Roses in "Sweet Child 'O' Mine". However "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" challenges the convention of having a stage and instead the band perform on the floor of the studio, where as the other two videos do follow the conovention as they involve stages. Overall I feel the most popular image of the rock genre is the electric guitar, making it one of the most widely used conventions of the genre. This is a convention all the videos shown here follow.
An entirely narrative based video is rare in the rock genre with the most popular choices for a video being either performance based or a cross between performance and narrative. However the conventions of an entirely narrative based video is for the narrative to be linear and to reflect the themes of the song, love or over coming adversity for example. In a cross over video the convention of a linear narrative is often challanged. "How You Remind Me" is an example of challenging this convention as the narrative regularly jumps between flashbacks of Chad Kroeger and the "love intrest" to the band performing before then jumping forward to Kroeger rejecting the woman. The video for "Have a Nice Day" does follow the convention of a linear narrative with band members been seen in an urban area surronded by images of the album cover the song comes from before the video finally ends with Bon jovi performing. Overall I feel an entirely performance based video doesn't have a narrative.
The conventional themes of a rock song are love and passion, rejection, over coming adversity and nostalgia. All three videos I've shown use these conventional themes. The themes of "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" are love and nostalagia and the lyrics reflect this "her hair reminds me of a once safe place" for example. similarly The themes of "How You Remind Me" are love rejection and the pain those feelings can cause, the lyric "I'm sick of sight without a sense of feeling" emphasises this. Finally "Have a Nice Day" follows the conventional theme of over coming, which in this case I feel is economic hardship. "Looking for forgivenes and what's left to believe" is a lyric that best highlights this I feel.
Conventionally editing in a rock video has a relatively quick tempo with fast cuts and examples of invisible editing. Another editing convention is to cut from a black and white shot to colour, "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" follows this convention. Also conventionally the editing can be used to help reflect the themes of the song as well. For example in the narrative based scenes of the "How You Remind Me", the pain of the protagonist is emphasised by the slower pace of the editing and then speeding up again on the more upbeat performance based scenes.
Conventional camera shots for a performance based video are wide angle shots that focus on the whole band, as well as shots that focus on the band's leading members, which in the case of Guns 'N' Roses are Slash and Axl Rose. Conventional ways of doing this are with mid shots and close ups of the performer from various angles, as well as having conventions on how to film a specific band member. For example a popular way of filming the singer is to use a tracking shot of the singer moving up and down stage or a close up of the lead guitar playing during a solo. One convention of camera work in a performance video that "Sweet Child 'O' Mine" doesn't follow is shots of the audience to establish that it's a live performance. This is because there isn't an audience there during the video, which also challanges a convention of a performance based video. This is a convention that the videos to "Have a Nice Day" and "How You Remind Me" follow this convention as thier is an audience in the performance based scenes of the videos and thier are examples of establishing shots of the audience during these scenes.
For a narrative video or narrative based scenes of a video the camera shots have a more ciniematic feel and therefore have similar conventions. For example tracking shots of the protagonist moving down a street and close ups of female actors to help entice the target audience which I feel is men aged 16 and over. In the video to "Have a Nice Day" a convention that is challanged is to only focus on the frontmen of the band as throughout the narrative scenes of the video all members of the band are tracked across an urban area before being all together for the performance when the video reverts to the convention of focusing on the band's front men, Jon Bon jovi and Richie Sambora.
Excellent Henry. A low A/level 4 analysis with good detail shown.
ReplyDeleteYour next obstical is to improve the presentation of your posts and aim to encorporate more multi media into your blog.